Opinion: Left Won't Let Storm Go to Waste

Columnist Bret Stephens on the left's attempts to exploit Hurricane Sandy for political gain. Photo: Fox

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

... I ... opinion Journal Live by Mary Kissel ... Wall Street Journal's headquarters in New York City ... you're looking at some of the scenes of devastation caused by Hurricane Sandy on the New Jersey Shore ... and of course elsewhere the storm has claimed at least fifty five lives and left millions without power ... with severe damage to their homes ... our thoughts and prayers go to the victims and their families ... and we are left asking a question Why would any body play politics was that a formal events ... global view columnist Bret Stephens joins me now in studio ... to discuss Brett welcome ... the put up a quote from the New York Times editorial earlier this week ... and just for the viewers out there that might not have video listening to us just the audio ... Kofi was put back in working order by President Obama but ideology still aligns Republicans to its value ... many like the idea free and for Port people ... and I think people should pay for their bad decisions ... which this week includes living on the East Coast ... prep what's your reaction to the ... you know I think you judge ... the quality of someone's thinking by the kind of straw men that they construct ... and Dom if that meant Rick is right then ... the quality of the New York Times's editorial board of ... the intellectual quality is pretty low ... I mean this is one of these preposterous arguments that ... we conservatives Spain that ... you know there should be no role whatsoever from government and disaster relief in your on your own body and it's just ... it's just so silly and so's stupid that for this argument to be made ... and by the way ... they were disasters and have been disasters in Republican administrations in which the full strength of the all the arms of government from the Corps of engineers to femur and so on ... have been aam ... have been used ... so it's a really stupid and frankly insulting argument ... just because you don't think we have differences on blonde say you know block grants of Medicaid block grants to states ... doesn't mean you don't think there's a role for governments response to the UN emergency pecan we just that I was evacuated for my own art will extend a theme for a second time ... we had an editorial on this topic today that encourage folks to read it they can websites free today ... um what does Mr Romney actually wants to do was seen on what is President Obama is on the facts are not exactly sure there is any real difference between the two on FEMA's one of these kind of ... the ... tactics ... um that somehow ... conservatives are going to got the essential services of government feel was massively expanded after Katrina and so on ... what their issues with Federal ... emergency Management approved for the simple reason ... on the simple reason that most of the time ... local responders are the primary people on the scene of a share were this weekend and were our TV is blanketed ... with the various governors of the surrounding state telling us what to do at its and quite frankly thank you very much the government but at the local politicians of Mayor Bloomberg in particular Governor Chris Christie who've been dealing with this ... day in and day out ... and for all to large extent the federal the federal government has been not exactly a bystander but has been a sort of second order ... responder to up ... to the first of first responders ... that's the way it works part of what happened in Katrina was incompetent local governments ... both that that that this that the level of new Werle incident level of state ... well looks it looks like the governor has had these governors have learned those lessons from Katrina while ... I was up one last quote we've just got less than the left is from Eugene Robinson a Washington Post ... quell the dishonest solution proposed by Romney running mate Paul Ryan for the federal government's budget was ... relies largely on a shell game ... transfer unfunded liabilities ... to the States this is in the context of again it's easy to ... wear when you make of that ... the people to leave Eugene Robinson columns at ... the ... shore ... what ... okay well we're going to have to leave it that ...